To my fellow United States-ers, Happy Fourth of July! (waves sparkler)

I actually wrote this last week, but I wanted to wait to post it so I'd have something to put up on the holiday. Not as if this has anything to do with Independence Day, but still. I'm a holiday person.

So, as the poll tool hates me, I was unable to do a proper poll with my last story to ask as many people as possible what I should write next. However, one reviewer sent me a kind message with her recommendation, so this is what I'm writing. Therefore, this little piece is dedicated to you, Magiccatprinces! Hope you like it. And thank you, by the way, to all who read, reviewed, and/or favorited "Taisetsu"! My deepest appreciation!

Now … onto stuff about this story …

I present to you my next little piece, entitled "Asobou." It means "Let's Play." It is chock full of fluff. It is chock full of angst and drama. It is probably the most child-like thing I've ever written for YuGiOh, or for anything else, and yet it is also one of the more serious. Is it really possible to mix kiddy fluff and angst like this? Apparently.

This takes place in late canon, just before the Egypt arc. A few of you may know this part now: no romance intended, even more so than usual (but again, you are the reader, and you are free - and I mean no offense to any pairing by this statement at all). Rated for emotional turmoil and potential angst. Those who have forgotten their inner child are advised to stay away. Those whose inner child is sitting there reading this with them, take my hand, I'll show you inside. Same goes to those whose inner child is right there, you just don't know it yet.

I send all of you all my best. Have a marvelous day. Oh, and please leave a review. Pretty please, with a cherry on top.

By the way: "torly" is an Egyptian dish of baked squash, potatoes, carrots, onions, and tomato sauce. I've never had it – maybe it's delicious. You'll see what I'm referring to.

Asobou

Yuugi knew very well that he didn't need to knock.

His own instincts—not to mention the look his other self gave him as he opened the door—made that fact rather obvious. And yet it still seemed rude, somehow, to come in without knocking. He had gone in unannounced before, but that was before he realized his other self's tendency to accidentally sneak up on him. He supposed part of it, then, was a desire not to be scared out of his wits.

But a good portion of it was still just trying to be polite.

"Aibou?"

Yuugi fiddled with his fingers behind his back, though he did not know why he was holding them there. He met the other's gaze, then looked away, then met his gaze again.

"Um …" He bit the inside of his lip.

His other self never looked tired. At least not truly. Worn out from a round of consecutive duels, certainly, but only so much that he retreated into the Puzzle to take a break from the world around him—a concept still so very new to Yuugi and one he was starting to feel a little jealous of. And yet, somehow, standing there, his other self looked as if he had just been shaken from a nap. His eyes didn't sag, he didn't yawn. But he looked it.

And for that reason, Yuugi wondered to no end if what he was doing was a good idea.

His other self blinked, and a flicker of concern flashed across his deep violet eyes, his eyebrows furrowing in turn. Yes, Yuugi decided. This was okay.

"Do you want to play a game?"

It was only as the words left his mouth that he realized how very heavy they sounded. Words that had, so long ago, been as innocent as he intended them here, but words that had come to hold so much meaning. Pain.

Fear.

But he knew he was only imagining it when those emotions crossed his other self's face. The other boy blinked, his eyes suddenly looking several years younger in wonder and surprise. But not quite displeased.

He gripped the edge of the thick metal door to his room, and he glanced away for only a second before looking back, examining Yuugi with eyes that burned into his very core.

He lowered his eyebrows.

"What kind of game?"

Yuugi grinned.

Words had rarely been truly necessary between the two of them, and now was hardly an exception. All Yuugi needed to do was nod his head, and his other self followed him across the hallway neither of them had ever bothered to fully explore and back into Yuugi's own soul room.

He still wasn't terribly familiar with his soul room, granted. It was still new to him, and the very concept of being in it baffled him to no end. Getting there from his own room had taken nearly half an hour of concentration and plain old wishful thinking, and eventually wondering if the Puzzle was trying to mock him, until that stubborn artifact finally relented and allowed him entrance into the inside of his mind.

He stepped in without a second thought, but he could almost feel his other self stop. He could feel the sudden pulse of anxiety that went through him, and he turned around.

His imagination had done a good job of rendering the image beforehand. His other self stood just outside the doorway, still in the hall, not even letting his hands—which he held close to his chest—go within the apparently sacred space. His eyes grew wide and cautious, and he peered around the room as much as was possible without actually going inside.

"Well," Yuugi started, and he tried to sound even gentler than usual. "Come in."

His other self blinked, but after a moment, he took a slow step inside.

After that, he came in in full.

Yuugi's smile returned.

His other self was still silent, fiddling with his wrists, watching Yuugi like an eagle one moment and glancing away the next. Yuugi wondered, if only in the back of his mind, if he thought there was something wrong with him being here. He almost brushed the thought aside. Almost. But not quite.

One more glance from his other self and Yuugi jumped in realization.

"Oh! Right. The game."

Even though he still said nothing, the confusion and nervousness emanating off of his other self was so thick Yuugi could have reached out and scooped it into a waffle cone. He had calmed a bit, though, as if the strangeness of the room had faded, and now it was just unfamiliar.

It was a simple place, Yuugi realized, now that he got a chance to really think about it—it seemed that whenever he came here there was something important going on, and he was never able to take a moment to contemplate it. It was just a small room done in white with toys strewn all over the floor, a lot like his actual room had looked about eleven years ago. He might have felt embarrassed by the fact that everything in here consisted of blocks and games and small pillows and stuffed animals and little robots that walked two meters and lit up when you wound a switch on their back. He might have felt even more embarrassed when he tried to plop down on the ground, only to sit down on what felt like a xylophone, then slip off of that to hit his head on a giant bowling pin with a face.

But his other self sat down as well, and as Yuugi watched him look around, all he saw in those elegant violet eyes was wonder and respect. Almost as if this room was a great deal nicer than his own.

Yuugi restrained a laugh.

He put his hands together and offered another smile. His other self blinked. Yuugi frowned, if only a little, and at last reached over—having finally managed to find a decent place to sit without being poked in the butt by a robot arm—to snatch a cardboard box several centimeters thick that he had spent nearly ten minutes hoping he would find when he first arrived here. He held it out in front of him.

His other self blinked again.

"A puzzle?"

Well, although they had never actually done any jigsaw puzzles to his knowledge and he had no idea where his other self had attained the knowledge, at least he was saved an explanation.

He nodded with a much shyer version of his earlier grin. "Uh-huh. Just a … little something I thought up for this place. Guess my 'thought experiment' worked. Three thousand pieces."

He paused, as if expecting his other self to say something. His other self looked at the puzzle, then back to him, and back to the puzzle. Yuugi sighed.

"You want to give it a try?"

His other self's head snapped up so fast that Yuugi wondered if he had broken his neck before remembering that he didn't actually have one.

"… both of us? Here?" His other self shifted, crossing his legs in the normal position he seemed to prefer. He broke Yuugi's gaze for a moment. "Right now?"

Yuugi swallowed. He looked away, but he didn't look back. He stared at the box. "I mean, if now's a bad time, we can always …"

"No."

The word came out harsh, and it forced Yuugi's head up, slow but firm. Yuugi found himself staring into strong eyes. Eyes that remained strong for about two seconds before embarrassment and worry seeped in. His other self sat back, and it almost looked as if there was a rare tinge of pink surfacing to color his cheeks.

"Now's … fine. Really." He pulled his lips into a smile, and it somehow looked forced and completely natural at the same time. "A puzzle sounds great, Aibou."

The twinge of disbelief that still snickered beside Yuugi remained, wondering if his other self was actually in the middle of something important and was just doing this to please him, but Yuugi swatted it away, and he smiled as well, letting the jigsaw puzzle shift in his hands and the pieces slide around inside. He nodded.

"Then let's go."

It was simple, if a three-thousand piece puzzle of any sort could be described as such. In his little mind creation, he had left the box blank. Habit, he supposed, from spending eight years solving an ancient artifact when he had no idea what it looked like. But he preferred it. He thought only of the many tiny pieces awaiting them inside as they clicked against the sides, and the small smile he had plastered onto his face turned genuine and about five years old when he opened the top to see every puzzle piece beaming back at him. A quick glance saw his other self leaning forward, all hesitance forgotten, his hands on his knees as his eyes widened in anticipation and excitement at the challenge before him.

Oh, yes. This was going to be very fun indeed.

Yuugi spent several minutes trying to clear out a space large enough in that tiny little room while his other self dumped the pieces onto the ground and spread them out. Toys protested by turning on and blinking lights and beeping or squeaking as Yuugi pushed them aside. But he ignored them. After all, this was his soul room. Didn't that mean he could do with it as he pleased?

Strangely enough, the room almost seemed to comply with his wishes as he went along. He would have thought there wouldn't have been nearly enough room to lay out the puzzle without sitting on stuffed animals and robots given the small size of this place, and yet by the time he had set each toy by the wall, the room felt … bigger, somehow. Not very much, granted. But bigger.

He would have to ask Ishizu-san if she knew anything about the laws of physics within soul rooms.

He relished in being able to plop down on the floor without being stabbed by the edge of a block. The white floor wasn't exactly soft, but comparatively, it was a little piece of heaven. He crossed his legs and clasped his hands neat and tidy in front of him.

His other self had wasted no time, not as if Yuugi had actually expected him to. Yuugi knew him, as well as one ever could. There were plenty of secrets left, but if one thing had stayed the same since the day Yuugi became aware of his presence, it was that his other self simply could not resist a game.

Or, more accurately, a challenge. And this most certainly qualified.

Yuugi found him sitting on the floor, leaning over, as if he had completely forgotten the apparent discomfort of being in someone else's mind that had seemed to consume him not a few minutes before. If Yuugi hadn't known better—and this time, he wasn't even sure he did—he would have said that his other self had forgotten he was there. Both his hands moved, swift, precise, hard at work flipping little cardboard pieces so they showed their face. Some colored shades of blue like a sky with some cloud white and a few that seemed to mark the gray of a street. But nothing else. Nothing to point them in the direction of solving it.

Not unlike the Millennium Puzzle had been, now that Yuugi came to think about it.

His lips twitched into a smile at seeing his other self so genuinely excited for a game when so often games had come to mean life-or-death scenarios, saving the world, or regaining a grandfather's lost dignity, or more often two or three mixed together. Shadow games. The Seal of Orichalcos. Duel Monsters battles to determine their very fate.

Yuugi kept that tiny smile, his eyebrows softening as did the rest of his face, and he slid across the floor to the other side of the pile. He picked up the two halves of the box and ran a half-interested finger over them, just as much half-wondering how he had simply willed a new object into his own mind, and what would happen when its purpose was complete. He tossed the pieces aside, and scooted forward.

"Got any?"

His other self didn't look up. He flicked his hand to the side, as if trying to point to something but too concentrated to realize he hadn't finished the gesture. "Those edges. See if you can find more."

He seemed plenty occupied with his own task of working on what looked to be the sky. Yuugi smirked again and shook his head, but he didn't protest. He slipped his fingers through the piles of puzzle pieces for ones that matched the dull crimson of the second edge his other self had begun.

"This one looks like sand."

"Hm?"

His other self finally turned his head up. He blinked and furrowed his brow. Yuugi twirled a discovered corner piece between two of his fingers.

"This one. See?"

A pause. Another blink. Eyebrows lowered, if only a bit. "Aibou, that's brick."

Yuugi turned the piece over again, and he stared at the crevices painted onto the surface of the small piece of cardboard.

"Oh." He felt a blush on his cheeks, and the corners of his mouth twitched up into a sheepish grin. He slipped the piece onto the ground. "Heh, sorry."

His other self stared at him for a moment. Yuugi couldn't be sure, but he had been with his other self for long enough to tell when he saw the beginnings of a smirk growing on that normally-stoic and formal face. One of his other self's eyebrows quirked.

"Sand does not look like brick, Aibou."

"It can!"

The eyebrow rose further, and this time the smirk just about distorted his face.

Yuugi stuck out his bottom lip and clenched his fingers. "Sometimes!"

The expression on the other's face didn't shift. And even though he was mocking him, Yuugi had to admit that it was good to see him smiling. Well, smirking, but that was close enough.

It was hard to believe in that moment that he had once been an ancient pharaoh ruling over an entire country. A king, sitting within Yuugi's own mind putting together a puzzle with him, smiling as he went back and forth between looking back at him and pressing pieces into the unfinished image on the floor.

Yuugi still had a lot of difficult imagining his other self as a king.

His other self let the tiniest of chuckles slip past his usual façade, and he clicked another piece into place. "So Jii-chan was able to pay for your ticket?"

"Yeah." Yuugi spotted several crimson pieces and slipped them in, one by one, little twinges of satisfaction sparking within him as each fit into place. "My dad's work pays most of our bills, so he has a lot of savings from running the game shop."

He flicked his eyes over to the blue sky that his other self had almost finished. If it weren't for the fingers that moved each piece from the pile to the puzzle, it would have looked like the sky was growing all by itself. Clouds, and the pale baby blue, just grazing the tops of buildings. His other self's eyes shifted back and forth in searching and discovery faster than Yuugi had thought even a spirit's eyes could move.

"He keeps telling me all this stuff about Egypt."

"Such as?"

His other self didn't look up this time, but Yuugi could see his eyebrows perk. Yuugi clicked in the last crimson piece and got started on what seemed to be a concrete road, finally finding a place to set the piece that was not sand in a pile separate from the rest. "Like this really gross food he had on one of his expeditions a long time ago."

This time Yuugi saw his other self glance at him. Something that seemed so incredibly close to curiosity flickered through his violet eyes.

"What gross food?"

Yuugi scrunched his face. "To … Tor … Torue?" The word sounded wrong on his tongue, but he brushed it away. "Something like that. A bunch of vegetables and sauce. He said it was so gross he ended up drinking all their water on the expedition just to get rid of the taste, and they had to go back for more after half an hour."

His other self chuckled, louder now, less restrained. Yuugi couldn't figure out whether it sounded more regal or more like the teenager he vaguely appeared. "Anything else?"

"It's hot."

"Well, I expected that much."

"Dry, sizzling hot," Yuugi added, stretching out each word as Jii-chan's description formed within his mind. He wondered if his imagination had more power in this place, or there was just some nonexistent air conditioner someone had forgotten to turn on. "Doesn't mix too well with all the sand."

His lips turned up again in a half-smile that he imagined resembled a smirk. He didn't even need to look to know how much of the puzzle now lay completed on the floor on his other self's end of things. His other self had started clicking in the soft green of a few trees. Yuugi pushed his end of the Puzzle closer, almost seeing where the two sides would connect. His smile grew.

"Do you think the Ancient Egyptians ever went barefoot?" Images ran through his mind of tan-skinned people in white linen like Ishizu-san, without shoes, hopping back and forth on sand twice as hot as the air. Yuugi bit back a laugh. "I wonder if they burned their feet off."

A pause, tense and quiet.

"I … wouldn't know."

Silence. The heaviness of it weighed down on him, and this time he was quite certain being here made all things felt and imagined more real. The room seemed to shrink around him, though nothing really moved that he could see. It took him several moments to work up the courage to look at his other self sitting across from him. His other self did not look up, but merely slipped another piece into place.

The smile that had left Yuugi's face returned. Soft, gentle. Real. "Well, you'll know soon enough, won't you?"

Another pause. Yuugi stared at the ground for a moment before glancing at his other self again. His other self still did not meet his eyes. There was some expression on his face, something that made Yuugi's chest feel chilled and empty, but he could not for the life of him read it.

"Yes. Yes, I will."

Yuugi grabbed a few more puzzle pieces, though he did not notice particularly what they were. He clicked each of them into their place almost without having to think. Crimson to crimson. Blue to blue. Gray to gray. Connecting each, though they were all different. They all drew together. They all met in the end.

His smile remained. It tugged on his cheeks even when a part of him wished to will it away.

"I'll be okay on my own, you know."

He didn't have to look up to feel his other self's head snap to attention. He didn't really want to see the stunned expression he knew was on his face.

"I mean, I know I already told you, but …" His smile tugged more, and he felt a vague discomfort growing behind his eyes. He forced it back. He swallowed and nodded, ever so slightly, if only to himself. "I will. And I'll … I'll miss you, but … I'll be alright."

His other self did nothing to respond. Yuugi could feel the stare that was on him, those wise yet so naïve eyes burning through to his core. He could hear the faintness of the breaths that were not really breaths from the one who sat on the other side of the puzzle.

Yuugi slipped a few more pieces into place. Easy now. So simple. So natural. He let a tiny chuckle slip past his defenses, and the discomfort behind his eyes returned. "This is what you're supposed to do. You've done so much for me. This is the least I can do for you."

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see his other self shift. His hands were in front of him now, on the ground to balance himself as he seemed to lean forward, whether or not he realized it. The puzzle lay forgotten in front of him. Yuugi clicked more pieces in. One. Two. Three. Four. He heard the quiet, thick emotion in his other self's voice, and once again, he tried not to imagine his face.

"Aibou …"

"Really."

The discomfort grew. Yuugi clenched his fists and relaxed them. He didn't look up. He snatched piece after piece, slow but precise movements. One at a time. Almost done.

"You've waited a long time, just … protecting me, taking care of me. And here I am, showing my gratitude by … h-holding you back."

He breathed in, and out, air that wasn't real and yet felt somehow soothing going in and out of his lungs. He felt the cardboard beneath his fingers. He felt the curved edges of each piece, and for a moment he imagined they were made of gold. Smooth gold pieces with no set destination. Never knowing where you were going next. Just trusting that wherever you ended up, it would be good.

The pressure building behind his eyes almost broke him now. He still restrained it, pushed it back, but he felt the vague shimmering warmth in his own big eyes. He wondered if tears here were real.

Another chuckle. This one trembled, and he felt the warmth surfacing in the corners of his eyes. He blinked hard. "You don't deserve that. You should be able to go back where you belong."

Piece after piece. Each another step toward an end.

"You'll be happy there. And I'll … you'll get to have your own life."

A nod, though he did not mean to do so. He felt the piece within his fingertips, and he let it stay there, contemplated, appreciated, before he lowered his hand and slipped the jigsaw into its rightful place.

He smiled. "Look, it's finished."

Each of the pieces fit together in what looked like a large photo. The crimson building he knew from the road to school, the sandy brick of the candy shop, the concrete of the sidewalks and the cars on the street, the big sky he saw above him in the morning. A quiet, simple day in Domino, with people walking to and fro, as they always had. And as they always would.

Yuugi heard the soft, long breath of his other self and saw his hands and feet shift as he adjusted himself on the floor.

"Yes. Yes, it is."

Silence fell over the room again. There were no birds chirping outside or cars breezing by on the streets, or Jii-chan fixing a late night cup of tea. None of this was real. It was just him and his other self, alone in their own minds, with their finished puzzle and the darkness that seemed to be slowly settling around them.

Yuugi did not even question whether his own soul room had begun to dim. It was soft now, darkening. He did not try to stop it.

He looked up.

His other self still sat there. If he had been looking up this whole time, staring at Yuugi, Yuugi could not tell. He stared at the floor now, and the golden bangs that hung over his face blocked most of his expression from Yuugi's view. The only other sound was his faint inhales and exhales, and the only movement was the gentle rise and fall of his chest and the dark jacket shifting on his shoulders with each little twitch.

Yuugi leaned forward, over the puzzle, and tried to vain to look him in the eyes. The tears he would not let fall glimmered and shone. He felt each blink pushing them away. "Mou hitori no boku?"

His other self shifted this time, and he seemed for a moment to curl up within himself, though his movements were slight.

"Aibou … I …"

At last, he turned his head to meet Yuugi's gaze.

There were no tears there, not as if Yuugi had ever expected there to be. But there was something else in his eyes that Yuugi could not define, something that made his chest ache and made him almost shiver from the chills it sent through him. His other self's eyebrows furrowed in the space between them, and those old, wise eyes suddenly looked so helpless and young.

He shifted again, and now Yuugi could see his feet push him forward. He did not stand, but his hands moved, and he crawled in as elegant a motion as one could make so to avoid actually crawling. His hands nimbly evaded toys and stuffed animals and papers, and his knees and feet moved as he navigated around the puzzle, toward Yuugi.

He opened his mouth, and Yuugi could not quite read the words he was going to say.

Then, in one split instant that happened so fast and so slow that Yuugi had both a million years and no time at all to register it, his other self's hand caught on the puzzle box that had been set aside, and he came tumbling and sliding forward, knocking Yuugi to the ground and landing right across his back.

"Hey!"

The word came out without Yuugi intending it to, and it came out as half a grunt as the weight pinned him to the floor. It didn't really hurt, as he didn't expect he could get hurt in his own mind, but the force had knocked some of the unneeded and nonexistent air from his similarly nonexistent lungs.

He could not see his other self's face, but he could just imagine the stunned and horrendously embarrassed expression there. He wanted to laugh at it. He had a difficult time not laughing. But he managed it.

Yuugi put his hands to the floor and pushed himself up, and without even realizing it he felt his other self tumble forward off of him from the sudden jolt. He watched out of the corner of his eye as the regal spirit did a full somersault and landed upside down against the wall, his hair a sprawled mess around his head, his feet far above him, and his ever-stoic violet eyes blinking and confused.

This time, Yuugi could not keep back the half-laugh and half-snort that pushed forth.

And once it came out, he couldn't stop. He burst into a fit of giggles and laughter like he hadn't felt since primary school. He was hardly balanced as it was, and he nearly fell over again each time he dared a glance over at his other self, who still did not see fit to move, or even pull that flabbergasted expression off his face.

It was only in the back of his mind that he noticed the smirk, that terrible, malicious smirk that pulled its way onto his other self's face, and he was laughing so hard that he did not see the small pillow his other self had grabbed until it slammed against the side of his head.

He wasn't even fully aware of his hand grabbing another pillow, if it had always been right there or if it had appeared there for him. All he knew was himself forming a tight grip on the edge and whacking it back in the direction he had been hit. He felt it connect, and he laughed again.

Another hit to his head. To his middle. Another hit for him to his other self's shoulder and what seemed to be right on the spikes of his hair. He could only just hear his own laughter being mixed and melded with laughter the tiniest bit different. Just a little deeper, just a little older, swirling into his own and echoing around the room as the only sound other than the pillows whacking against their targets.

He felt himself knocked backwards when his other self threw away the pillow and tackled him to the floor, doing another somersault from the force but pushing Yuugi to the ground as well. This time Yuugi was ready. He pushed to his feet and threw himself forward. He could feel his hands grab onto his other self's shoulders as he tried to pin him down, and he could feel the gentle force of his other self's knees rolling him off and moving instantly to pin him in return.

Laughing, never stopping, never short of breath. Yuugi snatched his pillow with one hand and used it and his free arm as defenses, and his other self mirrored him. He rolled onto the floor again, not caring of the force of the impact, and he pushed against the wall to give himself the forward shove needed to tackle his other self yet again.

And Yuugi did not bother to notice the light in the room grow bright and overpowering, and he did not question whether the walls of the room stretched to give them all needed space to play.

The Rubik's Cube was his favorite.

It had always looked like such an odd contraption before, when he had watched Aibou solve it again and again in his room in what seemed to be an incredibly pointless, endless loop. And when Aibou had handed him the multi-colored cube after finishing their second game of Scrabble, he honestly thought the boy had lost his mind.

But this was even better than Scrabble. It was almost comparable to Duel Monsters.

The other games they had played were still strewn across the floor, as an examining glance over the room told him. They hadn't even bothered to put away the Scrabble board that Aibou insisted he hadn't intended to put here. Yami didn't bother to tell him that soul rooms did that a lot. Aibou's was certainly no exception.

It had taken him several full games to notice that their little scuffle had knocked pieces out of the puzzle. A few out of the corner of the sky, it seemed. But that didn't matter. They would replace them soon.

His fingers turned each side with smooth and easy movements, already practiced, despite the short time he had had to learn them. The pulse he had learned long ago was not a real pulse grew loud and fast within his chest as the colors matched up. Yes, red to red, white to white, one more turn here …

Yami smirked.

"Aibou, look, I finally got i—"

He looked up, and the words stopped just behind his lips.

He supposed it had been a while since he had checked on Aibou to see what he was doing. He had assumed he had picked up another one of the many games while Yami worked on the Rubik's Cube. There were definitely plenty to choose from.

But Yami did not fight the smile that tugged on his lips when he saw Aibou lying against one of the larger stuffed animals not a meter away from him, one arm behind his head, asleep.

He hadn't even known that someone could fall asleep in their own soul room—though he supposed all he had to go on was himself, and he wasn't exactly the best example, given that he never slept. Once again Aibou had taught him something new. The tiniest of chuckles escaped him as he set the Rubik's Cube down with all possible silence and slipped over to sit beside the sleeping boy.

He had always thought that Aibou's innocence glowed brightest when he slept. When for once he could forget all they had gone through, and all they were to go through, and just pretend that life was all fun and games. As it well should be.

And as it soon would be again.

Yami closed his eyes and nodded.

He opened them again. Aibou did not stir when he laid a gentle hand on his shoulder. Apparently he was just as deep a sleeper here as he was in the real world. Either that, or he had just tired himself out from their tackle fight.

Very vaguely, he wondered if he had ever had anyone to play with in his former life. Anyone like Aibou to laugh with and tackle and hit with pillows. A part of his mind told him it was silly and childish, and as a pharaoh—whether or not he actually remembered anything about being said pharaoh—he should be more mature.

Another part of his mind laughed at the very idea, and poked his forehead to reassure him that there was no law here against fun.

He smiled once more.

With a skill so often used and long-perfected, he closed his eyes and opened them again in the real world outside.

It was dark. It had been dark when Aibou had first come in, but now the moon was well into the sky. He didn't bother to slip around to try to find the clock Aibou definitely had but never seemed to have out. He didn't particularly want to know how late it was.

His gaze fell upon the boy that sat against the side of his bed, slumped forward, legs sprawled and arms hanging limp to his sides. The Puzzle still hung around his neck by that now-familiar chain. It glinted in the moonlight streaming in from the two windows, and Yami cocked an eyebrow at it and wondered for the millionth time if the thing had some form of consciousness of its own.

It would have been some small comfort to know he wasn't quite as crazy as he sometimes felt.

Aibou breathed in and out, his chest rising and falling. His fingers twitched in his sleep, and the Puzzle moved with his body. Slight, but he heard the sound of metal clinking against metal, and against Aibou's black shirt.

Yami slipped into Aibou's body with such incredible ease, and this time, he took a moment to settle the boy's mind and spirit into its own safe place in the comforting blackness. He pushed his—Aibou's—hands to the ground and levered himself to his feet. He wasted only a second looking around before he changed as quickly and quietly as possible into the familiar blue pajamas Aibou had laid out, stretched to pull out the kinks in Aibou's tired muscles, and settled Aibou's body onto the bed and under the covers as he felt the comfort of sleep approach.

He stepped out.

Aibou did not move as Yami stood again by the bed, his image transparent and unreal, and yet so very real, as it always was. He just breathed, never shifting, nestled into his covers and nestled in the darkness and safety of home.

Yami sighed.

The trip was in a few days now. He would go to Egypt, and he would show the god cards to the tablet that had been moved from the museum. He would learn everything he had forgotten.

And then he would leave.

It wasn't a choice, really. It was just fact. Just fact that he could not stay, no matter of the bonds that tied him so firmly to this world.

He looked again at the Puzzle that had found a place to settle on the sheets next to Aibou on the bed. It was hard, but if he looked close enough, he could still see the crevices where each piece fit together. So perfectly, and yet so very difficult. The Puzzle no one was supposed to be able to solve.

But Aibou did.

He placed a hand on the transparent version of the Puzzle around his own neck. It glinted for a moment, and the real one glinted in tune, like it was smiling and laughing. Aibou groaned and shifted in his sleep, turned around, and went quiet once more.

Yami let out another breath, this one not so heavy, and nodded once again.

"You'll be alright, Aibou," he whispered, with the voice he so rarely used that echoed about the room. "And I'll always be here to make sure of it."

And he would.

His lips twitched into a smile. He stepped back, not stopping until he sat in the corner of the bedroom, far from Aibou and the Puzzle, but close enough to feel the emotions within him settle, and his mind fill with that quiet peace. Yami sat down, legs in front of him, against the wall he could not feel, blinked twice, and settled his gaze upon the boy already taken by the dark and wonderful veil of sleep.

The moon sailed across the sky in the outside world, and Yami stayed, watching over his Aibou, taking in the wonder and joy of the time they had left.

Listening to the innocent laughter that rang like a song in his soul.

And never once did his smile cease.